Agri Vehicles Insurance from Greenlands

Author Topic: Brinsea Octagon question about fan  (Read 9077 times)

chrismahon

  • Joined Dec 2011
  • Gascony, France
Re: Brinsea Octagon question about fan
« Reply #15 on: August 15, 2015, 04:40:28 am »
We thought about the 190 cabinet Stereo but have since dismissed it after a local breeder had problems with our eggs. You shouldn't mix breeds because of varying egg porosity anyway. Our Wyandotte eggs are of excellent quality for eating as they store well due to low porosity shells. Unfortunately that makes hatching difficult because the air sac won't develop properly at standard humidity of 50%. They have to be run dry up to day 18. So when she put our eggs in with all the others, ours were the ones that died in the shells.


We're going to stick with our cheap semi-autos which have always given great results, simply because they have no humidity readout so you have to monitor the air sacs. They are well insulated so we don't get the temperature variations and hatching issues of cradle turned automatics either. Good results at just 12 degrees ambient, although we did have the incubator in an open box to protect it from draughts.

mentalmilly

  • Joined Nov 2012
Re: Brinsea Octagon question about fan
« Reply #16 on: August 15, 2015, 02:09:29 pm »
I had this problem with the membranes drying out when they hatch, called Brinsea and explained the problem and they told me the fan could not be disconnected and basically l was doing something wrong and they have never heard of this before.  Oh yes, seems like a few people have this problem and they don't know a way around it.  I have to keep a sharp lookout when mine start to hatch and spray the eggs a lot to keep them moist and this seems to work.  You should not have to do this though, but it helps.  Wish l had one without a fan now.

Stereo

  • Joined Aug 2012
Re: Brinsea Octagon question about fan
« Reply #17 on: August 15, 2015, 08:26:51 pm »
I had this problem with the membranes drying out when they hatch, called Brinsea and explained the problem and they told me the fan could not be disconnected and basically l was doing something wrong and they have never heard of this before.  Oh yes, seems like a few people have this problem and they don't know a way around it.  I have to keep a sharp lookout when mine start to hatch and spray the eggs a lot to keep them moist and this seems to work.  You should not have to do this though, but it helps.  Wish l had one without a fan now.

How do you spray them? Through the vent?

mentalmilly

  • Joined Nov 2012
Re: Brinsea Octagon question about fan
« Reply #18 on: August 15, 2015, 09:26:47 pm »
l put kitchen towels under the eggs, dipping in the water chambers to increase the humidity and have to take the top off the incubator to spray with warmish water.  So far its worked and if you are quick the temp does not drop enough to worry about.  l suppose a damp kitchen towel over the eggs would work too but you cant see what is happening then.

waddy

  • Joined May 2012
Re: Brinsea Octagon question about fan
« Reply #19 on: August 15, 2015, 09:41:44 pm »
I can see a warm water spray being a good way to rapidly get the humidity back around the eggs if you need to open. That sounds like a good tip Mentalmilly. It is interesting what you say about Wyandottes Chrismahon. My first ever hatch last year included six out of six Wyandottes but a few of the other eggs had problems with dry membranes and failed to hatch. I did have to open quite a bit to help free the last Wyandotte who was stuck with not enough room to manoever. What you said about porosity makes sense. My current batch includes six Wyandottes and six very dark Marans. I wonder if these will also struggle if the humidity is higher? It would have been better to just have one variety.


Helen

Marches Farmer

  • Joined Dec 2012
  • Herefordshire
Re: Brinsea Octagon question about fan
« Reply #20 on: August 16, 2015, 12:19:55 pm »
I hatch Wyandottes with a wide ariety of other breeds every year and haven't had noticeable differences in hatching, using any of my incubators (Brinsea, Covatutto and an unidentified Italian one). I use fresh, clean eggs, don't wash or candle them and just leave them alone until taking the dividers out and adding a little cooled, boiled water on day 18.

Stereo

  • Joined Aug 2012
Re: Brinsea Octagon question about fan
« Reply #21 on: August 16, 2015, 05:48:08 pm »
My Marans hatch best of all but I guess I have been working on my lines for some years now.  Also I find the most fertile eggs with very few empties.

HesterF

  • Joined Jul 2012
  • Kent
  • HesterF
Re: Brinsea Octagon question about fan
« Reply #22 on: August 23, 2015, 11:46:35 pm »
Bit late on this because I've not been on here for a while. I've now got three Octagons - two 20s (one the basic one - hate it, rubbish at monitoring temp & manually filling up as a required) and a 40. The only thing I've really found works for hatching is to run a jay cloth or the equivalent from the water channels up and over the eggs. Then it doesn't dry out because it's wicking the water up and it stops the membrane drying out by direct contact. This only makes a difference if they've pipped externally but that's where I've always had a problem before although more with the ducks and geese than chickens which seem to zip much more quickly and are less liable to get stuck. Had yours pipped inteternally or were they completely shrinkwrapped without even getting that far?

I'm currently working on the philosophy that failure to internally pip means it wasn't meant to be so poor genetics, failure to externally pip was a humidity problem throughout incubation (too big or too small) and failure to hatch having externally pipped is a problem with humidity whilst hatching. I'm sure it's all far more complex than that but that's where I'm up to with my trial and errors so far. All crazy given a hen just seems to sit there for three or four weeks and then hatch perfectly (although some dozy broodies have managed to stand on them after hatching which is worse). Even the broodies struggled with duck eggs this year so I'm going to have to have a more careful think about them!

H

 

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